The Swarm

TDS Editors

It’s almost a given: the biggest stories generate the biggest hate. So when this week’s hugest news – Amazon’s entry into the cloud realm – broke, we saw juicy headlines like this:

“Amazon’s Cloud Drive to Make Music Piracy Even More Convenient”
(Via New York Magazine)

Mostly this week, however, it was writers generating the best bile – which makes sense, we suppose: someone has to write the hate in order for us to read it! (DOH!) But writers definitely had some edge – like dream hampton recalling an old interview with “The ‘R’” on Twitter:

“R. Kelly got mad when I asked him abt Aaliyah. I got offended as fuk at him getting offended.”
(Via @dreamhampton313)

“Whoever came up with the idea to have Paris Hilton talk to Lil Wayne for Interview magazine deserves an award. It’s fives pages of the most hilarious Q&A ever printed, in part because Hilton can’t think of very good questions to ask besides “What’s your sign?”

I dunno, Drew Grant, maybe it’s because that’s what Interview magazine has done for NEARLY 40 YEARSNOW in EVERYSINGLEISSUE or something?”
(Via The Discography)

That’s a little harsh – Interview Magazine recently published a Q&A between R. Kelly and Will Oldham that was awesome! But we’ll take the hate where we can get it… Back to writers hating. We liked this critical tweet from those deliciously caustic Brits over at The Quietus:

“someone just emailed us saying that the new Fleet Foxes LP sounds like ‘Mulligan & O’Hare do Christmas carols’”
(Via @TheQuietus)

Firebrand financier and Ego Trip patron Ted Bawno also had some controversial shit to say:

“alotta black rappers are sellouts because they want to pretend like they know rock n roll and talk about Cold Play like they’re BLACKFLAG.”
(Via @TedBawno)

Teddy – callin’ out names! C’mon, Jay-Z loves him some “Cold Play” (sic) – they must be good! Meanwhile, even when writers were trying to say something nice, this week it just came out sounding like hate. Discussing the Dodos’ new album, his guy from the L.A. Times went out of his way to note “nothing should be taken away from the Dodos’ success” but

“At 7,000 copies [sold], it’s as if a little more than half of SXSW‘s paid registrants of 13,000 bought one.”
(Via L.A. Times)

Damning praise, buddy, damning praise… Meanwhile, Britney Spears new album got a more direct filet job from the press:

“At its best, it sounds like a party, with a cutting-edge pop soundtrack. The question of precisely what Britney Spears brings to said party remains as imponderable as ever.”
(Via The Guardian)

Sum 41, another longtime critic’s fave (not), managed some of the worst reviews of their entire career with the reaction to its new album:

“Revolting, messy, lazy, and undeniably Sum 41, Screaming Bloody Murder is a dead band moaning in its grave. Any highlights here more or less just belong to other, better bands, or even Sum 41 themselves from the past.”
(Via Sputnik Music)

Meanwhile, If you want to avoid hate, don’t get innocuous on Twitter. When Joe Jonas recently tweeted that the weather is amazing, the Internet had this to say in response:

“I can’t argue with that Joe! Spoken like the gentleman and scholar that u are! Truly quote worthy!”
(Via @TheDeadTrees)

One person, however, expressed her feeling that the sun doesn’t shine of critics’ behinds, in an essay entitled “Why Music Critics Suck”:

“I personally can barely find it within myself to care about the memories and feelings of my closest friends, yet alone some critic who lives god knows where and looks like god knows what. Don’t tell me how an album makes you “feel”, you jerkstore, just tell me how much it costs and I’ll figure out the rest…”
(Via Collapse Board)

Funny thing is – the lady who wrote that is a music critic! Would love to see her senior high school picture! Speaking of appearances, superstar DJ Diplo – an incredible hater who amazingly is making his first appearance here – recently took his fellow artist Dave Grohl to task because of some wrinkles: